The Architectural Heritage Fund (AHF) is excited to announce a new batch of Project Development Grants to community-focused projects that will contribute to the transformation of high streets and town centres in England.
… social enterprise and charity-led schemes to regenerate historic buildings and revitalise high streets…
The AHF writes:
This is part of a one-off extension of the Transforming Places through Heritage (TPtH) programme, made possible by support from Historic England. The grants were awarded at the March Grants Panel, where 20 awards overall were made to projects across the UK, totalling £735,041.
Transforming Places through Heritage was made possible with funding from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. The 3.5-year, £15 million programme, supported projects led by charities and social enterprises with the potential to contribute to the regeneration of high streets and town centres in England.
The programme made 338 funding awards, totalling £13,868,006, to 239 projects – these include schemes to turn former bank buildings into affordable housing and workspaces, libraries into modern community centres and department stores into arts and cultural spaces.
Matthew Mckeague, CEO of The Architectural Heritage Fund commented: “Transforming Places through Heritage allowed us to support a strong pipeline of social enterprise and charity-led schemes to regenerate historic buildings and revitalise high streets and towns. There is still huge demand for this type of funding from organisations and we are hugely grateful to Historic England’s additional investment to allow us to invest in a number of projects that will revitalise a number of very significant historic buildings with new, community-focused uses.”
Duncan Wilson, Chief Executive of Historic England, said: “We are delighted to be able to continue our support for The Architectural Heritage Fund’s work in reviving our high streets with the help of local communities. We have proven through our four-year High Street Heritage Action Zones programme that heritage-led regeneration can unlock a positive future for high streets. We also know how important local people are in bringing life to our shared high streets and AHF’s work will continue to put people at the heart of regenerating and reimagining a new future for these special places.”
